Wednesday, September 23, 2009

9Dragons is a game set in feudal Japan loosely based on historical facts. Time wise it is set in or around the time of the Ming Dynasty. There are 9 clans that each have a lost hero aka the 9 dragons. This game has some level based questing with an emphasis based on grinding and grinding and grinding.

Game needs to be downloaded via an online client or you can get a "free" DVD by paying a shipping cost.

The Facts (on a 5 point scale)

Graphics - 4

The Graphics of this game are better than average I would say (especially for a free to play game). There are times when you can see through a mountain or your character disappears. I must say however that some of the views are simply breath taking. This also game has fairly low graphical requirements to run the game which is good for those of us playing on older machines.

Replay Value - 2

Not only are the quests identical once you get of your starting area but the grind is never ending. There are times when I found I had no quests in a particular area and I had to grind up 2-3 levels before I could open them up. The mobs that you fight against do not vary much. Once you have reached level 25 you have faced most of the different varieties of mobs with only their level and toughness changing.

Community - 1

I played this game for 4 solid hours one day and not a single person spoke to me or offered help. I also asked for assistance on quests, grouping for grinding, and just general location information to no avail. I did this on both my low level character and a level 52 character. There seems to be good general information on the community forms located at the website but I judge a community based on what happens in game. Much like all games there are exceptions to the rule I did run into one very helpful player another day that was about 10 levels above me and helped me find stuff for about 1.5 hours. So thank you to Xyntha!

One thing that I find very unique about this game is the player based shops. You can actually go to a common ground area and turn yourself into a shop and then go away and other player based characters will come up to you and can purchase your wares. You must remain logged in but it's a great way to foster a player driven economy.

Mechanics - 2

The Mechanics of this game are somewhat difficult to understand. There are certain abilities that can be up all the time, and other abilities that are on to enhance your auto attack based on the weapon you choose. On top of all of that you have your casting spells that are broken into what type of a class you are. On top of all that you have micro payments of real money you can use to buy acclaim coins that you can in turn use to purchase in game items that help you in your quest for a limited time only.

Feel - 2

The movement on this game is point and click with the mouse so it's fairly easy to understand, however the locatorof the mouse on a 3D terrain that acts flat sometimes can be difficult to master. The game is one grind after another. The overall game play is awkward at times and if you don't know you have to grind up a level or two to open up quests you may be wondering quite a bit.

There is some PvPish content available on a somewhat limited world even basis in which you fight NPC's with the help of your side and they do the same. While the goal is to take out the other side's NPC's you can kill those of the other faction to help better your odds.

Personal Impressions

The first time I played this game was before I started playing WoW. At that time the MMO community was very new and fresh to me so the game was exciting. The game is not overall a BAD game. Its just designed with a very specific gamer in mind; the one who likes martial arts and loves to grind for hours on end with little to no rewards. I am not a fan of the game and when I tried it again I was falling asleep at the keyboard

Getting started

1. Download the game client (and then wait for patches to update)2. Get started playing!!

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